Citizen Fox: The global antitrust vision of Eleanor Fox

Posted by Social Science Research Network

Citizen Fox: The global antitrust vision of Eleanor Fox

By Philip Marsden (College of Europe) & Spencer Weber Waller (Loyola University of Chicago)

Abstract:     This chapter will examine the growth of Professor Eleanor Fox’s global and cosmopolitan vision for the future of competition policy. Over her illustrious career, Professor Fox’s scholarship traces an arc that began with the battle for the soul of US antitrust law as the Chicago School‘s influence began to dominate the discourse, enforcement policy, and eventually the case law. At the same time, Professor Fox also participated in the vigorous debate over the extraterritorial application of US law to international cartels, monopolies, and mergers.

Perhaps as a result of the changes in US antitrust law, Professor Fox became a prominent voice in analyzing EU competition law and explaining that system to US and international audiences as the influence of the US as the antitrust hegemon began to wane. EU competition law was a natural focus for her scholarship, given its more complete vision of competition law in numerous important ways that fascinated Professor Fox.

In more recent times, Professor Fox has also focused on the proper level of governance for competition policy in a globalized economy. She has focused on issues of gaps, legitimacy, and sufficiency to argue that global problems deserve, and require, global solutions. Depending on the specific issue, she has argued for the use of true international instruments and institutions ranging from international codes, WTO rules for competition policy, cooperation, harmonization, technical assistance, world restatements, as well as other hard law and soft law solutions, to solve the familiar problems of national competition law being used to regulate global markets.

What most distinguishes Professor Fox from most other scholars in the field is her cosmopolitanism, a willingness to look at competition issues through the lens of global welfare not tied to individual citizenship. While often controversial, this perspective has allowed Professor Fox to find creative solutions for historically intractable problems and maintain an unwavering moral compass in addressing competition policy as a means to address poverty, democracy, and economic justice for the have nots in the global economy. We salute these accomplishments and conclude by speculating on the future and the promise as well as the obstacles for the implementation of Professor Fox’s global vision.

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